LOOK BACK

One year ago, former Los Angeles police officer Christopher Dorner brought a “reign of terror” to the Southland, in the words of then Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Dorner, vowing revenge for his dismissal from the Los Angeles Police Department, threatened warfare against the LAPD.

“Everybody woke up believing that just by virtue of wearing the uniform, you could be a target. … He had everybody on edge,” said Tyler Izen, president of the union that represents LAPD’s nearly 10,000 sworn officers.

Dorner came from inside law enforcement and the manhunt for him dragged on for days — some say that explains why one man, acting alone, could bring intense fear and anxiety to professionals who deal with violent criminals on a daily basis. And they could potentially still be feeling the effects of that fear and anxiety.

But others say the entire incident was blown out of proportion and Dorner hardly brought the “reign of terror” these city leaders claimed.

‘You will now life of prey’

For 10 days, officers from dozens of police departments searched for Dorner across the region.

When it was all over, his killing spree left four dead, two police officers seriously injured and countless lives changed forever.

The manhunt began after authorities, investigating the death of Dorner’s first two victims, found a rambling diatribe Dorner posted to Facebook. In the posting, later dubbed his manifesto, he blamed dozens of members of the LAPD for his dismissal from the department and vowed violent revenge. His threats went beyond the named enemies and attempted to get inside the heads of his former colleagues.

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“I will bring unconventional and asymmetrical warfare to those in LAPD uniform whether on or off duty. … You will now live the life of the prey,” he wrote.

“Think before you attempt to intervene. You will not survive. Your family will receive that medal of valor posthumously. It will gather dust on the fireplace mantel for years. Then one day, it will go in a shoe box with other memories. Your mother will lose a son or daughter. Your significant other will be left alone, but they will find someone else to fill your void in the future and make them just as happy. Your children, if you have them, will call someone else mommy or daddy. Don’t be selfish.”

But it was more than these threats that spurred fear and anxiety in the law enforcement community, according to experts.

What really concerned them was that Dorner was once one of them, said psychologist Jerry Jacobs, Director of the Disaster Mental Health Institute at the University of South Dakota.

And it wasn’t just that he was highly trained in weapons and tactics of attack.

“What can really throw off our reactions to situations is when things go contrary to our expectations. To have someone who was one of them begin to be a threat to them throws things completely out of whack,” Jacobs said. “Everyone develops basic ideas of how the world works. When we have things that are contrary to that, it can be very overwhelming.”

When, during the manhunt, a Torrance police officer opened fire on an innocent man, mistaking him for Dorner, though he was white and Dorner was black, the District Attorney’s report said the officer was, in his own words, “extremely anxious, nervous and on high alert due to Dorner’s actions and threats.”

Another officer in the report said the anxiety among the officers was “palpable”

The length of the manhunt, dragging on for days, also contributed to the anxiety and stress.

“Workplace shootings are generally over in a matter of minutes. School shootings, some have gone on for an hour or two. But for the most part, these things are very brief. When you have such a high-stress period stretched out over a long amount of time, it is much worse,” Jacobs said.

Blown out of proportion

Terrorism and security expert Joe Ruffini isn’t convinced Dorner was as terrorizing as some say.

“Although this incident was unfortunate, it was blown way out of proportion. It wasn’t a domestic terrorist attack … it was a case of workplace violence and a man with a vendetta,” he said

The FBI defines domestic terrorism as acts that “appear intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping.”

“I don’t understand how (Dorner) was any different than any other guy,” said Ruffini, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who consults and teaches classes on security and terrorism. “With his threats, the tension is going to be a little higher, an officer will be looking over his shoulder, but it is no different than when an officer is in a high stress situation with a gang member. They can handle it.”

“People say everyone in the LAPD was scared to death. What evidence is there of that? … The officers I have spoken to said they weren’t,” he continued.

Ruffini said the media and Beck were to blame for exaggerating the situation.

“I think Chief Beck blew it way out of proportion. As soon as he called it an act of domestic terrorism, everyone believed him. He is the chief of police after all,” he said.

Among the enemies named in the manifesto was Randal Quan, a former LAPD captain who represented Dorner in hearings regarding his 2009 firing. Dorner’s first victims were Quan’s daughter Monica, 28, and her fiance Keith Lawrence, 27.

Later, Dorner targeted officers at random, as he had also threatened.

Four days after Quan and Lawrence were found dead, Dorner opened fire on Riverside Police officers Michael Crain and Andrew Tachias while they were sitting in their patrol car at a red light. Crain, 34, was killed instantly. Tachias, 27, was seriously injured.

And when Dorner finally met his demise in a cabin in the outskirts of Angelus Oaks, he attempted to take whoever he could down with him. He opened gunfire on officers as soon as they stopped in front of the cabin, killing San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Deputy Jeremiah MacKay, 35, and injuring Deputy Alex Collins.

Collins has recovered from his injuries, but he says he has forever changed.

“It’s changed everyone directly and indirectly involved. I know what it feels like to get hurt in the line of duty,” he said. “Every call is different. Every person is different. Every single day you’re on patrol anything can happen. In the back of my mind, I think about what happened and I know this is for real.”

Ordinary response to extraordinary events

Most members of the LAPD have moved on and no longer think about what happened one year ago, Izen said.

“Police officers tend to be people with very good coping skills,” Jacobs, the psychologist, said.

Still, Jacobs said it is important that affected officers receive mental health support.

“Stress is cumulative. If you add other stresses, if they are processing and coping, that stress builds over time. It can be a significant disadvantage for a police officer. It can impair their ability,” he said.

The reactions to traumatic stress are the same everywhere in the world, Jacobs said.

“This can lead to bad decisions. When you are a person responsible for people’s lives, that can be very dangerous,” Jacobs said.

The psychologist said officers can be trained to turn to one another for support.

“It is important to recognize that traumatic stress reactions are an ordinary human response to extraordinary circumstances,” Jacobs said.

He advocates that police and first responders be trained in psychological first aid — a new model for mental health in traumatic situations that is also encouraged by the federal government through its National Biodefense Science Board.

Under psychological first aid, entire police forces are given mental health training so that they can rely on one another for support in times of need, Jacobs said. Traditionally, first responders and police are provided group counseling by mental health professionals immediately following a traumatic event. But the effectiveness of this has been questioned in recent years.

“The goal is that everyone understands their reactions in these situations are normal, they are ordinary reactions to extraordinary events. And they turn to one another,” Jacobs said.